Nvidia has reportedly discontinued production of its GeForce RTX 3080 12GB graphics card, the most powerful variant of the original RTX 3080 GPU.
It's important to note that this isn't an official announcement, so take it with a grain of salt, but Twitter user and GPU enthusiast @Zed_Wang (opens in a new tab) claims that Nvidia will no longer be producing the card due to the price drop, writing "After the 3080Ti's dramatic price drop, the 3080 12G is now the same price as the 3080Ti and that's why Nvidia decides to stop shipping 3080 12G chips to the AIC."
No, only the 3080 12G has been discontinued. After the drastic price drop of the 3080Ti, the 3080 12G is now the same price as the 3080Ti and that is why Nvidia decides to stop sending 3080 12G chips to the AIC Jun 26, 2022
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We have to consider this a rumor given the lack of an official source, but have contacted Nvidia for clarification.
With the recent cryptocurrency market crash, the market has been flooded with cheap used graphics cards as crypto miners try to sell hardware to recoup their losses. This, coupled with the natural easing of the ongoing chip shortage, means that for the first time in nearly two years, graphics cards are available at MSRP.
It's typical for GPU manufacturers to cut production ahead of the release of a new generation of cards to free up space. Older hardware will still be relevant for a while, especially if current-gen cards see a drastic price drop when the RTX 4080 arrives, but generally speaking, Nvidia's attention needs to be more focused on producing Lovelace cards.
As PC Gamer reports, GPU prices at Newegg are pretty representative of the situation. There are currently five models listed under €800 (opens in a new tab), two of which are 12GB variants likely to shock the reader who is supposed to sell existing 10GB versions of the card, which is a rather unattractive offer if the 12 GB is the same price.
Given this, the explanation that the RTX 3080 Ti sells for the same price as the RTX 3080 12GB seems legitimate: there is no point in continuing to produce a card that prevents the sale of other surplus GPUs, especially one that was probably created not to waste. chips. .
Opinion: It was stupid to have two RTX 3080 in the first place
The 3080GB RTX 12 was first rumored back in December 2021, and when it was finally unveiled it turned out to be just a very minor upgrade to the original RTX 3080 GPU.
In fact, Nvidia may have originally planned to scrap any design plans, as rumors at the time went back and forth between anticipation of a release and suggestions that Nvidia would not release the card. . It's not uncommon for planned graphics cards to be canceled and then canceled behind the scenes, but it does create some suspicion.
The most likely reason we got two different variants of the RTX 3080 is that, at the time of its release, GPUs were even harder to come by than gold dust. Not surprisingly, we now know that crypto miners have spent nearly $15.000 billion on cards over the past two years, which likely contributed (if not directly caused) to the shortage. This, coupled with artificial inflation, has led to overpriced GPU prices.
This means that the RTX 3080 12GB was probably a consolidation by Nvidia to try and bring more graphics cards to market to fill the huge price gap between the original RTX 3080 10GB and the RTX 3080 Ti or RTX 3090.
It is also likely that these cards were created to prevent waste. Chips intended for more powerful cards may not have passed inspection, leaving Nvidia with a bunch of hardware that's too underpowered to fit in an RTX 3090 and too powerful for the RTX 3080. It makes sense to use them instead of wasting them. , so it's hard. I think the 3080GB RTX 12 was an intentional design and not just a recycling opportunity.
This is not an uncommon practice in GPU manufacturing. There's good evidence to suggest a similar situation occurred with chips destined for the RTX 3080 Ti last year. Still, creating two SKUs for the same GPU seems unnecessarily confusing to consumers, and the number of cards produced by both Nvidia and AMD seemed a bit excessive towards the end of this current generation.
This saturation is likely to fix the supply issues, so I really hope we get a miracle in this build. Fewer SKUs, improved inventory, and consistent pricing are almost impossible to guarantee, but as long as the cryptocurrency market continues to hurt, we might have the opportunity to buy a Lovelace or RDNA3 GPU at a reasonable price after launch.
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